I was gonna wait and get this out on a podcast (it's more convincing when I can just talk at you for several minutes ), maybe ep 125 or so, but the more I read of solicits and previews, I think there's a need to get this out there now.

I have a theory around where they're going with Issue 50, how TF/MTMTE/Windblade/Wreckers all play a part and will come together at that point for a short time, what the story arc is based around, and why this is perfect timing to do it from the standpoint of having synergy with Hasbro direction.

A few disclaimers:

I don't have all the books in front of me right now, nor do I plan on poring through them too hard to support my theory. It doesn't need it, plus the more holes left in my theory, the better that is for an ongoing discussion thread!

If you aren't caught up on the comics, and don't want plot lines spoiled, you need to turn around and stop reading. I'm putting one spoiler tag in this whole post. You've been warned and this is the only spoiler warning.

Some things here are based on conjecture/rumor/anecdotal evidence and not hard, objective fact. This wouldn't be very fun otherwise, and again, would be too stifling to discussion to warrant being put on a discussion board.

Some evidence here is supported by canon that is, for now, technically outside of the IDW canon. They've borrowed very heavily from Aligned continuity material insofar as it relates to world-building, so there's an overarching assumption that this will continue and be expanded upon. Pretty big leap? Yeah, maybe, we'll see.

If for some outlandish reason you think I have "Insider" information that I'm spilling out, you are wrong. First, I don't have such information, and second, if I did, it wouldn't be posted here like this.

Yeah, I used the hell out of the wiki. We all do.

I'm probably wrong. That is a-ok.

So with all that said, let's get to it. Issue 50 will hit us with the one plot line they haven't done in ten years. It's, probably, the biggest, most important story arc in Transformers lore that has only been skirted upon tangentially, if that.

See where I'm headed? Maybe so. If not, here's my hypothesis: The culmination of plot lines that comes to a climax (though not necessarily of the Shakespearean variety) in the "Issue 50"s is Unicron. Let's start collecting evidence. Windblade, you know not what you do.

Colonies, Titans, and Consequences

Ah, Windblade. You really do mean well. Let's get a Council of Worlds together and contact all the lost colonies and get all the Cybertronians and their descendants on other worlds together. It seems like a good plan, right? All of Primus' children at last coming together again. The other worlds that we've seen are places where the ancient Titans went off with the Knights of Cybertron (we'll get to them) to colonize. These Titans are pretty important, and some serious baddies in the series have wanted them gone or used for their own purposes at one time or another. These baddies include Tyrest and Bludgeon among many others, and we'll get to more on them later.

There are a couple reasons for bringing up Titans and colonization first. For one, almost every piece of evidence, though not all, to the Unicron theory being pitched here leads back to a Titan in one way or another without many degrees of separation. Additionally, well, here's where it starts to get tricky.

At the end of Chaos we find out that a signal has gone out, calling Transformers from around the universe home. When did they leave? After the Knights of Cybertron (presumably with some contingent of the Guiding Hand if that's not who they are themselves) defeated Mortilus. They left on Titans. We know from Chromedome's look into the mind of the Circle of Light's Titan that it too had heard this call and wanted to return home. Doesn't this mean the rest would want to? Presumably. But most importantly here, where did this signal come from? Vector Sigma. What is Vector Sigma? Primus himself, supposedly. Why would Primus send such a signal?

Here's where there are a couple theories. The first is the more "face value" one, and probably what I think is closest to right. With the power from the Matrix, along with the lack of life that needs sustaining on Cybertron's surface at that moment in time, Primus can "fix" the planet, and is calling his children home because he's the Light-Giver and Life-Giver. It's a benevolent act. Windblade and others are currently helping him out, and this is going to get Unicron's attention. Probably not wise.

There are a couple alternate explanations here, but the other plausible one I'll mention is that through the exposure to the D-Void/Dead Universe, Primus sees that Unicron has awakened, and in Marvel G1 style needs to bring his children back to make their stand. Alternately, we borrow from Aligned Continuity's Covenant of Primus on this one. The surge of energy from the Matrix accidentally awakens Primus, even if it was just for a fleeting moment. This makes him visible to Unicron, and in his last moments before slumbering again, Primus calls back his children as best he can.

If Unicron has indeed awakened, where might he be hiding out? Is he hidden in plain sight? I think so, and we'll look at one of those possibilities next (there are plenty, but the best one I'm saving for last).

Blackrock, Jupiter, and Skywatch

If there's one character that seemed like a pointless set piece upon their first introduction, it'd be Garrison Blackrock. Turns out, he had the Enigma of Combination, somehow knows an old form of Cybertronian, has reverse engineered a crap ton of Cybertron's technology, built a small fleet of Ramjet and Thrust clones, and may or may not have existed three years ago. If there's one thing we know about this guy, it's that he is up to something. You don't just help Decepticons build space stations near Jupiter, and you don't just have crazy programs called ominous things like the Onyx Interface for kicks. By the way, he also has (ok, had) a space bridge, which as we've learned from stories involving Titans, are a Big Deal.

So just who is this guy? I'm still not sure, but we know he's connected to the EDC, which is an offshoot (or the replacement of) Skywatch, and they were at one point manipulated somewhat by this group called The Machination which was eventually controlled by Scorponok, of whom we have no idea where he is anymore.

So here's the theory, and maybe this one has some holes. Ok, lots of them, but this guy has to be some kind of different based on everything we've been shown so far, right? Perhaps Blackrock is a somehow survived Abraham Dante, or maybe one of the other Machination agents. Maybe he's a Nebulan, and all his weirdness is due to cybernetic enhancements and things like that. Maybe he's Scorponok himself. It's tough to say who he is, but there's definitely something off about him. Oh, by the way, how long is it from when The Machination goes down to when we see this guy on Earth? Three years.

This leads to another weak part of this theory as a whole, but one that seems really fun. The Jupiter "commune" is the start of a new body for Unicron, its construction being ordered by Galvatron is no coincidence, and the Decepticons are being drawn there to be eliminated early because they're perceived to be a pretty legit threat. Sure, they aren't the "good guys" per se, but they haven't been shown to be too keen on the universe ending either.

The preview for 45 helped me out a bit more, as we'll see way later in this post. Blackrock says that Onyx is his "Digital Chimera". In this context, Chimera would be defined using Webster's second definition for the word:

Merriam-Webster Dictionary wrote:Chimera: an illusion or fabrication of the mind; especially : an unrealizable dream <a fancy, a chimera in my brain, troubles me in my prayer — John Donne>

So fanciful an illusion that even Jetfire, the turbo-nerd of our current xRid/TF book cast, can't quite get it replicated. It's like it doesn't want to be found, even when observed. Remember that point, shelf it in the back of your head, and we'll see if you can find where this becomes relevant later.

Galvatron

Galvatron gets some mention above, and for obvious reason. But could he, somewhat stereo-typically, be involved in this Unicron plot? Almost definitely. Strap in for words. The IDW version of this guy is complicated.

This iteration of Galvatron is old. Super old. First Cybertronian War old, which as we learned from Nightbeat's conversation with the Necrobot, is highly super unusually old. Thirteen Primes old, at least, if not moreso. This is the dude that killed Nexus Prime and drove Onyx Prime off planet. He was like a bro to Nova Prime, and Nova Prime is basically pure freaking imperialistic, Cybertronian-anthropocentric conqueror type evil.

And then he died.

Except he didn't really, and continued to serve Nova in un-life, wandering about the Benzuli Expanse on missions, hanging out on Gorlam Prime, and eventually shooting Nova in the back because of reasons that are probably abandoned and only living in Simon Furman's head for all of ever.

And then he died.

Except once again he didn't really, and was reborn as the villain from Kingdom Hearts? the carrier of the foreboding-sounding Heart of Darkness. That sounds pretty evil, like Unicron, though that's not quite where we're going on this one.

More weird stuff happens - he brings Cyclonus and Scourge back to life, encounters a crazy dead-universe being called the D-Void that brings Nova back to life, dispatches them, sends Kup and a bunch of zombies to the Dead Universe at the start of time or something, takes over Cybertron, uses Kimia to try and Death-Star Cybertron out of existence, accidentally unleashes the D-Void anyway, and is stopped by Optimus Prime using the Matrix to fix up Vector Sigma and stop D-Void.

And then he died.

C'mon, you have to know how this paragraph is going to start, right? He was really just sent back to the Dead Universe to re-kindle his bromance with Nova, who is all about helping out Shockwave with this Dark Cybertron plan, though when Galvatron finds out (after Nova dies totally for real this time guys, really) what the real purpose is, he's clearly not a fan. A singularity of energy to perpetually feed Cybertron that destroys everything else in the universe?

If Cybertron, the planet with Vector Sigma (Primus, probably) at its core, is the only thing that exists in an otherwise dark universe, who is that a problem for? If something called the D-Void starts to consume the energies of the living universe, who is that a problem for? If Nemesis Prime/Nova Prime yielded the "Darkness" and successfully completed his Expansion plan, who is that a problem for? Who is always standing in the way of these things, albeit by manipulation/accident failing at it in the case of the D-Void?

Your answers, of course, are that these things are a problem for Unicron and that Galvatron is a strange, conflicting anti-hero at times because he's serving Unicron's interests. Super old? Check. Killing Primes? Check that off the list too. This guy refused to even serve under Megatronus of all bots.

If we're looking for an ancient servant trying to guide the universe in a way to be ready for the eventual return of the Chaos Bringer, look no further. Is it contrived? Maybe a little, but for me, it works out to fulfill that piece, plus it works with his use of the humans to build him that station mentioned before.

Shockwave, You're Not Done Yet

Shockwave was mentioned in the above while writing about Galvatron, and while I'm not super into this theory myself, it's worth pointing out. Shockwave is logical, and the Dark Cybertron plan/prophecy/whatever isn't very logical except by a really twisted stretch of said rules of logic. It's out of character for Shockwave, truthfully. All that planning, all that biding time, just to end it all? Like many, I had a hard time with Dark Cybertron. It felt like a "man, we need to clean up this old continuity so we can truly move forward" type of event, or put another way, it felt very forced.

I have faith that it wasn't, because this creative team has earned that trust with me. So that said, my head-canon (yep, here's your warning that this is it because there isn't much concrete evidence to it) is that Shockwave somehow knew Unicron's resurrection was imminent in the near future, so he hit the "kill switch" so to speak on his long game with the ores and decided to destroy the universe instead. The ores were his plan to stop the inevitable, Unicron's rebirth, but being so darn smart he devised a way to use this as a fail-safe as well. Those ores could fuel an army of Titans, each with crazy special powers like not dying (because no one else has that one! Oh wait.) Titans might know where Guiding Hand dudes are that have powers of Primus which could fight Unicron or maybe draw out some of the surviving thirteen to do so.

This part's all a bit loose, but it didn't feel right to delete this section, which very almost happened. Might be fun to chat about though, and it's certainly the part of this theory I can most be convinced otherwise of.

Syndromica

Let's move on from all that and take a look at some other characters we haven't considered a whole lot as of yet, but who keep popping up from time to time during perilous events. Bludgeon and Jhiaxus take a while to come together for good, but when they do, it's Bludgeon that's actually a bit more interesting to look at here.

Jhiaxus though first - he's basically Galvatron's bro and is going to help support him. And then he dies (not the first time), for good, and his story is over.

Bludgeon helped him along the way though, and his story gives us some additional hints to this getting-into-a-high-word-count theory. He seems to be working for Megatron, though truly seems to instead be helping out Shockwave which we eventually find out is pretty much the case that Bludgeon would want someone to think. Bludgeon tracks down his old master (presumably, right?) Jhiaxus, then proceeds to try and help out with the Dark Cybertron plan, but then has doubts when it looks like Jhiaxus is actually helping Shockwave. In other words, it seems that maybe he was indirectly trying to help out Galvatron through Jhiaxus, and I've already talked about what I think Galvatron is trying to do.

There's something else to this, and I think there are a couple issues of Robots in Disguise that you need to pay attention to: Syndromica parts 1 and 2. Bludgeon and Jhiaxus are here to collect an ore, sure, but maybe there's more to it, and maybe my readings above on their motivations are a bit skewed. There was a planet involved, LV-117. Jhiaxus wants the soil to do some time-travel wizardry to help Gorlam Prime, because he had a vision just as Ironhide did of Pax Cybertronia when the Matrix and Vector Sigma dispelled the D-Void and sent out that pulse. He also, however, mentions that "true chaos" is coming, so maybe that's why he needs Gorlam Prime to fulfill Nova's vision of a grand, restored to the glory-days Cybertron.

Bludgeon is here too, keep in mind, and they're indeed doing some fun time traveling on this planet that seems to, maybe, not want to be observed. It's also destroyed at some point in the future, a future which Orion Pax saw. What could destroy a whole planet like that? If you can't answer that one, have you even been reading the rest of this?

LV-117 is also tied in closely to Wheelie's story, whose story is tied closely in to Quintessons. Wait, what? If you didn't read Monstrosity, it's easy to forget that yes Virginia, this world has Quintessons and maybe they have some plans.

Tyrest, Star Saber, and Pharma

Holy topic change, Batman! C'mon now, I've gotta be going somewhere, right? And we haven't seen much of anything from More Than Meets The Eye in this theory, but this is where things continue to come together.

So this Tyrest guy. He's been around, and is former (?) buddies with Nova Prime. He's studied Vector Sigma a lot, helped a whole ton of robots get the hell off of Cybertron after doing so, and he created this computer that decides how guilty or innocent you might be. Turns out that computer didn't really care if you were innocent if you were constructed cold. This drives him to guilt, he goes nuts and tries to kill everything constructed cold anyhow, and then disappears after his defeat to "we don't know where".

Then there's Star Saber. To say the least, he's a bit controversial in the IDW continuity, but I'm not here to opine on that right now. We really still don't know much about him in this continuity, so this is short, but we do know that he's a religious fanatic, doesn't like these Circle of Light guys at all, and has a pretty twisted view of Primus. Maybe something twisted it? It still remains to be seen, but after getting shown up by Cyclonus in one of his most bad ass moments of all time, he also disappeared via teleport, like Tyrest, into the land of "we don't know where".

Finally we have Pharma, and while most of his backstory is (as far as I can tell) inconsequential, when he's shown up by First Aid in one of his most bad ass moments of all time, he is pulled through a mysterious portal by metal tentacles into the land of "we don't know where".

So three former Autobots (despite whatever badges persist on them, I mean come on) of the nastiest varieties disappear, leaving an unresolved plot point, that is furthered by the hint that a Quintesson may have been what got hold of Pharma. These characters demonstrate true corruption, which is what Pentius the Quintesson wanted to do to Megatron throughout Monstrosity before failing during Primacy. That corruption was for the end goal of something we haven't been told yet, but is it far fetched to think that the Quintessons are going to have some serious connection to Unicron?

After all, someone on LV-117 kind of carved a Quintesson face on a rock and those folks bounced through time a lot, presumably to the point where the planet's destruction could be seen. Maybe Wheelie saw this too at some point, and this gets hinted at right before we hit the end of Chaos. Wheelie even gets off LV-117, presumably knowing its fate, on a Quintesson ship.

With all that said, I think the Quintessons are involved in trying to help Unicron's return, and what better heralds than corrupted pillars of society? What would the Primes say about that?

The Reluctant Primes

There are at least two Primes at the moment, one of the ancient variety and the other of the and-so-duly-named type. Optimus Prime and Alpha Trion, both due to plot threads and their status, would have to have some role to play in this arc as I start trying to coalesce these ideas into how it all gets resolved.

Alpha Trion is really the last big bit of set up for this. He brought Galvatron and Nova Prime together, believing the vision of a united Cybertron not divided by tribal warfare under various Primes would be a good course of action. What we don't know is whether or not there was any malice to this, or if it was just an "oops, those guys weren't very good after all lol" kind of thing. We also know that he's hanging out in the Pax Cybertronia vision of Gorlam Prime with Ironhide, and that he's downright crotchety to Optimus in their last conversation, which, by the way, is the first time any of our characters truly realize he's one of the thirteen. He was also dead set on finding the Enigma of Combination, and has been for literally millions of years. It'll be interesting to see what happens if he gets back to Cybertron where it is currently just sort of chilling out on a desk or something.

Alpha Trion is Omega's Conundrum in this story. He's got a role to play, and he may have even set some of this up in ancient times, but we probably won't know until events come to pass. I'd guess they'll err on the heroic, but reluctantly so and only due to wisdom, side.

Then there's Optimus, who as mentioned before witnessed the future destruction of LV-117 by something, and was quite taken aback. To me, this was the point where he changed course back towards the path of being Optimus Prime again, away from the Orion Pax identity he oh-so-briefly took up the mantle of once again. He's a reluctant hero, and seems to currently be playing the role of everyone's disappointed dad that had to show up, fix things, and can't leave yet because you're still whining to him but he just wants to go fishing, dang it.

I'm not sure what role he has to play in the set up of things beyond what we know and the role we've seen him harbor in Combiner Wars as assumed deity to various worlds. Star Saber would probably not like that, and I think that'd be a fun battle to see if handled correctly. Whatever his purpose here, he does have the Matrix, and that's pretty darn important.

The Scavengers

I'll be quick about this one, since we're on the cusp of two months of books where we'll catch up with these characters. Grimlock is going to be important in some way, because holy crap, he hasn't done anything of real substance in IDW's continuity for what, five years? That's a long time for them to rest on their laurels with an A-List character. I'd suspect, since they're on the way to Cybertron, that he'll reunite with the other Dinobots, since they've got time coming up to spend with Victorion in the Sea of Rust as we've learned in solicits. Just please, please, no Dinobot combiner, although that would end up making sense if it were how Grimlock regains his sense of who he is. I still don't want that to happen, we don't need a Dinobot combiner. Get offa my lawn with yer combinin' everything these days. Worse than five Decepticons in a room with Trailbreaker.

That ship they're in is going to matter as well. Just too ominous. I don't know how it will matter though, and again, with previews for the Scavengers next adventure likely days or just a couple weeks away, I'm just leaving this in for fun speculation, and to say that I'd bet a good amount that their soon to occur resurgence in the story is no accidental timing. Neither is another book coming out soon.

Wreckers, the wrecked, and Redemption

We'll be seeing some of the Wreckers here soon enough, and we've learned through some small teasers that this is where we're going to see the emotional baggage picked up by many characters throughout this long journey come to be important.

Again, this one's coming up soon, but here's my guess on what's up using the solicits and teases we've gotten so far. Prowl needs help and calls for it, because he finds out that Rattrap is a herald/agent of Unicron. He's been shown to not hold allegiance to anyone so far, and this would be a nice hearkening back to the early-mid Unicron Trilogy era comic stories where beasts were used as heralds, plus keeping beasts in the fold might help out giving some love to Beast Wars' 20th and TF:TM's 30th birthday years simultaneously.

Kup and Arcee will be involved as we've seen, and it's pretty well assured anyone else surviving Last Stand of the Wreckers will as well. This may be where Overlord comes in for some purpose that I could only imagine, he is still out there after all. I think by the end of it, whatever internal strife and conflict is still up in the air at the end of Sins will be overshadowed when they discover another world. A war-world, with a big group of scary Decepticons that they just might end up having to work together with to stop a colossal, universal dominating type of threat.

Tarn's Army

You need a ringer to fight a universe-threatening menace? How about several dozen? How about you team them with a barely held together new team of Wreckers? How about throw the Enigma of Combination at Liokaiser? How about you stretch out the potentially amazing confrontations and consequences of Megatron's character journey by making everyone fight Unicron and figure it out later?

That was a lot of rhetorical question-marking going on up there, yes, but I think that's where you go with these guys, for now. They'd be one of the only believable threats, as I see it, to an antagonist as powerful as Unicron.

One more question for this short, speculative section - There's always the Matrix, right?

Zero Point

It's pretty clear, I think, that we're not going to have another arc where Optimus Prime is your deus ex machina hero, not so soon after he just did that in, oh, almost every other big event arc in IDW. At least, I hope it's time to move on from that. Optimus carries the Matrix, yes, but you need the drama brought about by hopelessness if you're gonna do a Unicron story right, or at least I think you do. Certainly, all the new Transformers from colonies that have deified the idea of The Prime would probably be a bit taken aback were something to happen to Optimus Prime. I'm not suggesting that you kill off Optimus here - that's also overdone, but it would be interesting to see something terrible happen to him to take him out of action, whilst also separating him from the Matrix.

So that leaves the Rodimus option to save the day, or maybe even Megatron, or perhaps even the DJD-led army hanging out with Wreckers that I postulated above. I think these are all too obvious.

The colors of sparks is important, and only a few in the IDW Transformers universe have been pretty explicitly stated to have it. One of these has been out of action for a long time now, and there's this Wreckers-centric mini-series coming out soon, and why not bring in Doug Flutie off the bench to take this one home? The quarterback reference here isn't me throwing in bad analogies (because I certainly do indeed do that) again, it's because I'm talking about Springer.

I think Springer gets brought back in a big honkin' way during this, lighting our darkest hour and saving the day. Heck, you can even use this as an excuse to upgrade him and make a rockin' new Leader Class toy. I never, ever knew until right now how much I need a Space Winnebago that has helicopter blades. Dreamy...

Oh right, this post. Yeah, I think this is happening. It's a nod to the G1 cartoon when Rodimus Prime gets too dramatic too quickly into his tenure as leader and seems too ready to pass on the Matrix, and it's a nod to Marvel UK, and these books happen to have a great historian and steward of those books involved in James Roberts.

This does lead me to ask, what about Rodimus?

Rodimus and The Lost Light Crew

Ok, really though, what help would this whole crew be against Unicron? They'd probably go on five sidequests on the way, get there ten minutes after the battle ended, Whirl would punch a guy, and then they'd leave. You think The Lost Light is going to help with some Universe ending problem again? There are things to do on this Quest and fighting the freaking Chaos Bringer can't be one of them.

In all seriousness though, there are definite elements on The Lost Light that could come into play here. Megatron's story is leading to a serious collision with the group I've picked out as the "shock and awe, try to rally the troops to save the day" bots. There are tons of other unresolved plot threads from the Remain in Light story involving much of the crew. There's also Skids, Whirl, Cyclonus, the list goes on.

We all know they'll have something to play, but really, this was prompted by analyzing why I wouldn't choose Rodimus as the hero here. I don't think there's anything necessarily wrong about doing so, it could certainly fit the narrative, but it also seems too obvious. Hey guys who will ever stop Unicron? Oh, hey Rodimus, you've never done that in any fiction before, right? This is another place where I trust the creative team to not do anything too obvious or overdone. It'd also be great character development for Rodimus going forward. He wants so badly to be important, to be The Chosen Best Transformer Ever. How fun could it be to see how he copes with someone else using the Matrix to stave off the threat of Primus' opposite? Maybe he could go talk to Rung about it.

He might be hard to find though, he's not always someone that bots can always recognize as there, even when in plain sight. Tough to remember his name too, what was it? What's he turn into anyway? What did the Functionists work out it being for?

Yeah, I'm going there.

Rung: Chaos Bringer

To close this out, let's have some fun, in case you read this and didn't already.

Rung is Unicron. He's always there, always observing, and a master of Transformer psychology. Unicron is meant to be terrifying not just because he's huge and can eat you, but because if he wants, he can manipulate you into doing his bidding. Who else would be able to skirt through millions of years, basically unnoticed, but be, as we saw in one alternate plane of reality, such a terrifying threat for the Functionists? And hey, the Functionists themselves are nightmare fuel already, so that's saying something.

There's some other supporting evidence here too. The "Digital Chimera" line, LV-117's bouncing through time, and surely other examples support the idea that he doesn't want anyone looking too deeply into him. He's miraculously survived some things that should not be survivable. Roberts has told us to totally not read into him, meaning we should probably read into him. Maybe he's not Unicron himself, but some servant that activates him and needs that Jupiter base built up, or some conduit for his spark. It's tough to say, and call me crazy, but I think this would be amazingly great twist storytelling.

Hopefully that's a fun way to wrap up this theory, and to finish it up, here's a picture of Rung being ominous, followed by a picture of Nightbeat checking over a diagram of his alt-mode:

I mean, come on, those are some hints!

I hope you had fun reading this, and look forward to discussing this bit of tin-foil hattery with you all.

Motto:"Well, when I see five weirdos dressed in togas, stabbing a man in the middle of the park in full view of a hundred people, I shoot the bastards! That's MY policy!"

Weapon: Photon Blaster

Holy ****, Scotty! That is some intense speculation. But really awesome! Great theories and really well written.

I sooooooo want you to be wrong about Rung, but you're probably not. After thinking Brainstorm was a traitor and going through that, I don't know if I could handle Rung being evil.

I liked your ideas about Blackrock. I mentioned on one of the Twincasts that I didn't think he was human. Now I'm thinking he's a holomatter avatar for someone.

I really do hope we get the return of Springer and Grimlock. It's been too long for either of those characters to not be in the stories. Hell, it's been long enough, that I can't really even remember what IDW Grimlock is like?

As Asia sang, "only time will tell..."

"One of them even took the time to smear, “Fans are TeH SUCK!!!” in poop all over my windshield!"

You are a magnificent creature, ScottyP. Thank you for taking the time to type all of that up.

That said, some points of further discussion incoming!

Galvatron and GB Blackrock

There are interesting parallels here in terms of oldness. Blackrock insisted on Uruk, Mesopotamia, his family line being as old as the oldest thing in human civilisation, he cannot be placed and we have no idea what his endgame is (unless it's just 'ultra-capitalist evil Steve Jobs', but I doubt Barber can be that glib).

And that to me sounds familiar. It resonates. It bounces off purple Conanesque warrior king Galvy himself. As ScottyP says:

This iteration of Galvatron is old. Super old. First Cybertronian War old, which as we learned from Nightbeat's conversation with the Necrobot, is highly super unusually old. Thirteen Primes old, at least, if not moreso.

Picked up again on my last line.

Shockwave, You're Not Done Yet

(I really hope he is, actually. But more out of closure than anything.)

LV-117 is also tied in closely to Wheelie's story, whose story is tied closely in to Quintessons. Wait, what? If you didn't read Monstrosity, it's easy to forget that yes Virginia, this world has Quintessons and maybe they have some plans.

Ah, here's my issue with this section: I remember, though I cannot for the life of me place it anywhere in my memory or notes, either Barber or Ramondelli saying that the Cybertronian Trilogy had not that much bearing on the ongoings. Now, then again, Barber is unlikely to completely ignore a whole three volumes of story, however platitude-y they may have been.

Adding to the Quintessons, and bringing back the TFmultiverse:

Couple this up with those strange metal tentacle things that sort of snuck away into 'Cyberutopia' the following, too.

Tyrest, Star Saber, and Pharma

With all that said, I think the Quintessons are involved in trying to help Unicron's return, and what better heralds than corrupted pillars of society?

As much as the wordage, verbiage and typiage are impressive, I don't buy Unicron as such. I'll keep thinking on this.

To add to the last point though:

Another, third, older than Kup and Skylynx's great-grandparents? That's a Decepticon, a human and an Autobot. Hmmmmm.

Doctor McGrath wrote:That was fun dude. It flows logically & is for the most part, very plausible. I'm afraid you set me up for some severe Springer disappoint though. IDW has some big shoes to fill..

I set myself up for disappointment too I think it'd be really fun to see him fulfill his hero-quarterback destiny, at least temporarily. That, and imagining Milne getting a crack at designing some kind of Springer Prime is pretty darn fun.

Va'al wrote:Galvatron and GB Blackrock

There are interesting parallels here in terms of oldness. Blackrock insisted on Uruk, Mesopotamia, his family line being as old as the oldest thing in human civilisation, he cannot be placed and we have no idea what his endgame is (unless it's just 'ultra-capitalist evil Steve Jobs', but I doubt Barber can be that glib).

And that to me sounds familiar. It resonates. It bounces off purple Conanesque warrior king Galvy himself.

Yeah, this plus RodimusConvoy13's idea above about Blackrock being a holo-avatar, it really wouldn't surprise me if it turns out he's Galvatron's avatar.

Va'al wrote:Ah, here's my issue with this section: I remember, though I cannot for the life of me place it anywhere in my memory or notes, either Barber or Ramondelli saying that the Cybertronian Trilogy had not that much bearing on the ongoings. Now, then again, Barber is unlikely to completely ignore a whole three volumes of story, however platitude-y they may have been.

Given the stuff in Spotlight: Wheelie, I feel like those lines were possibly meant to distract. Or, to take them another way, the events within the Cybertron War Trilogy don't have much impact, but thematic elements aren't really mentioned?

Va'al wrote::snipped image of Skids looking at who knows what:

Couple this up with those strange metal tentacle things that sort of snuck away into 'Cyberutopia' the following, too.

I do really want to know what this is. Easily one of the most mysterious pages we've seen!

Va'al wrote:Another, third, older than Kup and Skylynx's great-grandparents? That's a Decepticon, a human and an Autobot. Hmmmmm.

Ooh, this is good and the part in my response where I say I'll think on it more! Could be a fun parallel here.

Motto:"A good head and a good heart are always a formidable combination."

Weapon: Sniper Rifle

Loved reading the detailed thoughts behind the theory that you shared with us podcasters (off air) a few gatherings ago. Lots of deep thinking and inference based on drawing together so many pieces of information.

I love the Rung theory. The really least likely like ever herald of Unicron, or a piece of the big guy himself (minicon Was it Dead End? Is actually our first Rung figure. The key to unlocking Unicron's bad-ass-ness, like he Armada toy. But the hm avatar of him, doesn't seem to represent something pure evil...and they were supposed to be recalibrated to better represent the bot's personality.

GB Blackrock- I hope he is as interesting or more compared to what you have him being. I'd love for him to be Galvatron's holomatter avatar.

Interesting that one of the covers for an upcoming MTMTE focuses on Whirl's avatar. Perhaps one of these two theories will get more information when that is explored (although GB and Galvatron are not in MTMTE as we all know).

As a fan of Springer, I'd like to see something good or bad happen to him, like Tarn is Springer, or something, but I think Springer's too much of a pure good guy to be able to do things like Tarn has--and there are so many other contradictions. Anyway, with Prowl at least in it somewhat, and I hope the recovering Springer is recovered, SINS OF THE WRECKERS cannot come soon enough.

Speaking of the DJD I cannot wait to get them and the Scavengers back into some stories again. The DJD being so awful, they help to set the tone for bleakness and struggle, and the Scavengers are an interesting bunch of misfits with a big character amongst them. I look forward to Grimlock's return and for he to return amongst the dinibots, and perhaps, make them into a cohesive, angry, fun group again...

Megatron's role in all of this was only hinted at by you. Perhaps, we are in need direct representatives of the thirteen to defeat Unicron... Megatron representing Megatronus, Alpha Trion himself, GB for onyx prime, Optimus for himself (cause he's one), Arcee for Solus Prime, rat trap for the beast prime...was it amalgous? And so on...

I like your Rat Trap theory. Making him a HUGE player would be nice, and make me value his version of him as more than product placement.

The Titan Wars idea for creating bigger versions of themselves to fight is cool too. Makes me wonder what significance Blaster would play in that as we've seen his proposed possible Titan Wars leader toy. Just a toy, or story significance too?

This kind of conjecture is what I love about good writing and good stories. The mystery, the theories, and the then 'never as good as the theories' eventual payoff.

I can't believe all the little details I've forgotten. I really do need to go read the Tyrest issues again.

Tigertrack wrote:I love the Rung theory. The really least likely like ever herald of Unicron, or a piece of the big guy himself (minicon Was it Dead End? Is actually our first Rung figure. The key to unlocking Unicron's bad-ass-ness, like he Armada toy. But the hm avatar of him, doesn't seem to represent something pure evil...and they were supposed to be recalibrated to better represent the bot's personality.

Yeah, if he isn't actually the big guy himself, I could see it being something like that. His stickness activates all the TVs inside him or something

Tigertrack wrote:Megatron's role in all of this was only hinted at by you. Perhaps, we are in need direct representatives of the thirteen to defeat Unicron... Megatron representing Megatronus, Alpha Trion himself, GB for onyx prime, Optimus for himself (cause he's one), Arcee for Solus Prime, rat trap for the beast prime...was it amalgous? And so on...

I actually didn't make the potential Onyx Interface/Onyx Prime relationship connection until reading your paragraph here. Good catch, and maybe quite interesting! We did just see Onyx's Hitler Nazi Robot Bird from Kung Fury Titan, Chela, get killed off by Starscream in Windblade 2-6.

Tigertrack wrote:The Titan Wars idea for creating bigger versions of themselves to fight is cool too. Makes me wonder what significance Blaster would play in that as we've seen his proposed possible Titan Wars leader toy. Just a toy, or story significance too?

Hmm, Pipes did record a message for Hubcap and gave it to Blaster, and with Hubcap being in SotW soon, not implausible that his role would increase. Also if the rumors are true, much of next year's brand theme will be a celebration of the 30th birthday of TFTM.

A little bit more support from this today from the December solicits. Here's some more fuel to the fire - SotW's "Chimeracons". Name wise, connected to Blackrock's mention of a "Digital Chimera", and also to Micronus Prime's artifact which is the Chimera Stone (thanks to D-Maximus_Prime in the solicits thread for pointing that out!) Micronus Prime is the ancestor of all Mini-Cons in the Aligned Continuity, but you know who is in other continuities? Unicron.

Motto:"There are no impossibilities in the multiverse, just small minds unable to comprehend the possibilities"

Weapon: Star Saber Sword

I've taken Rung to be a source of new sparks. I think when he touched down on Luna 1, HE activated the long dormant sparks, and his altmode is somehow related to birthing new cybertronians. Functionists would hate this since we have an individual capable of creating new life, upsetting the whole thing of Primus alone creating pure cybertronians. I do not feel Rung is related to Unicron, rather he is relateable to Primus more. I don't believe Unicron will come for issue 50 since I don't feel they've had enough buildup. Maybe later, but not now

D-Maximus_Prime wrote:I've taken Rung to be a source of new sparks. I think when he touched down on Luna 1, HE activated the long dormant sparks, and his altmode is somehow related to birthing new cybertronians. Functionists would hate this since we have an individual capable of creating new life, upsetting the whole thing of Primus alone creating pure cybertronians. I do not feel Rung is related to Unicron, rather he is relateable to Primus more. I don't believe Unicron will come for issue 50 since I don't feel they've had enough buildup. Maybe later, but not now

This is also a very solid theory and I wouldn't mind seeing it hold true either. Good stuff!

I think you're onto something here, even if I don't completely agree with parts of the theory. I think Unicron is coming, although I think the writers are playing a longer game here than just having appear and declare war in the issue 50 storylines.

As far as Rung is concerned, I think the comics have pretty well established that he doesn't know what his purpose is, which makes me think that the Rung persona, at least, is not evil. I don't think he's actually Unicron in any event.

I think Rung is Unicron's prison.

We know that Rung turns into a stick or pole-like object, that seems to taper a bit at one end and flare at the other. So, what is it? I think it's a key, and that it is either literally or figuratively the means of freeing Unicron.

I think this could go myriad different ways, but I'm partial to the theory that Rung is Unicron with a shell program written over him, as a means of both keeping him pacified and trying to turn him away from evil; Rung is, after all, among the best Cybertron has to offer in terms of character.

Or, maybe Rung is an actual key that will unlock Unicron's essence inside Earth (drawing from the Prime continuity and explaining why the Enigma was drawn there), and the Jupiter colony is Unicron's new body, as you theorize.

In any case, I do think there is a solid connection between Rung and Unicron, and that we probably will see the writers starting to tease that out in the coming story arcs.

That was an intense read...I need to catch up with some of the issues but I will say that I have a slightly different take on rung, being that he's unicrons opposite and in a reference that harks back to the unicron trilogy, fits into the omega lock to reactivate Primus.

Though we could all be wrong and rung could be pivotal in the issue 100 arcs as the key to something none of us have guessed

If I take the capital letters out of Spinister's note to Fort Max in today's comic and rearrange them, I can make: ROBERTS PLAN IS UNIKROA. Or ROBERT IS UNIKRONS PAL. So could be something, could be nothing. A much more risky interpretation of those typos that includes all the lowercase mistakes except the two "y"s and two "x"s at the end gets you to "ROBERTS PLAN IS TAN IS UNIKRON", which could also be fun. Could also be grasping at straws with that. Who knows.

More Rungian conspiracy from today though!

Why in the world is he so curious about what Fort Max has discovered here?

The symbol that Grimlock's drawn, which we've seen before on Luna 1 and elsewhere, looks suspiciously similar to that of the SCP Foundation with only a play on the symbols and wording so as to not be dead on the same. Why does this matter?

The two mysterious bots at the end (One of which could be Liege Maximo? Maybe he's working with Quintus Prime looping us back to the Quintessons mentioned in the original post? That's a whole other derailment for another time.) sport the symbol, and mention having to report to some nebulous "Grand Architect".

The Jungian personality type INTP is referred to by Keirsey as "Architects", and reading through the characteristics, it fits Rung pretty well. His name being inspired by Jung, it made sense to look up "Jung Architect" in google which pretty much lead straight to INTP. The implication here is that the two bots at the end are working for Rung.

I mentioned the SCP Foundation earlier, and remember how Rung is hard to remember? I present to you, maybe, another piece of the puzzle to link Rung to that symbol: SCP-055. Sounds familiar.

I'm either a crazy person, or maybe some bits of this are turning out true after all. Maybe only the 'Rung being some big evil villain' thing is right. Obviously the story has to go on after the arc(s) that start with #50, and I'm less convinced that's really where this comes in (moreso convinced now this may be the third Hasbro-synergy arc after Titans Return) especially given the All Hail Optimus solicitations. Either way, still fun to come in here and put the tin foil hat on from time to time. Let me know what you think of these new bits of information!

Motto:"There are no impossibilities in the multiverse, just small minds unable to comprehend the possibilities"

Weapon: Star Saber Sword

i for one took Rung's appearance as a counselor since Max probably still talks to him to help him out with his issues. I am still convinced he is not bad and has a larger role that involved bringing cybertronians hotspots back to life (like MTMTE 17). Also, what if the "Grand Architect" Is a prime, Like Solus Prime alive? And there are other primes still alive too. it would fit well with Titans return and Prime wars, and it will have MTMTE involved but still doing its part for its quest

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